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Hi!

I’m just back from the Sword and Balkan event in Belgrade last weekend. It was a great trip, with some of my absolutely favourite rapier bouts (my classes went pretty well too). I’ve written up a review of the event here.

I had a day to look around Belgrade while I was there, and can 100% recommend the National Museum. I’ll be writing that up properly in due course, but in the meantime, two highlights:

How had I never heard of Jovanovic? His work is amazing. Later that day in the Military Museum I saw some of the weapons these Haiduks (Serbian freedom fighters) in the painting were festooned with:

Top tip to colonial oppressors: Do not fuck with folk who dress like this. It always ends badly.

Online Course Updates

I’ve updated the Medieval Longsword Course, at last! It’s now much easier to find what you’re looking for. If you’re already enrolled, you should be able to see all the updates in the course curriculum. I have left all the original videos in as well, so if you happen to prefer the old format (or are just used to it), you haven’t lost anything.

It’s included in the Mastering the Art of Arms subscription (along with everything else!), and also in the Medieval Italian Martial Arts subscription.

Everyone on any of my subscriptions, please send in questions in advance for our Office Hours on June 21st, which will start at 15.00 UK time. I’ll put links to the meeting in the course contents, and send it out by email too.

We also have two new lectures from Dr. Toby Capwell.

Armed in Alabaster

One of the most evocative of medieval art-forms is found not in museums, but in parish churches all over England. Funerary effigies, carved in alabaster, bring us face-to-face with the real Middle Ages. They also provide a unique way to understand the art of the armourer in England. No English armour has been preserved from earlier than the sixteenth century, but many long-lost masterpieces of armour-making were carefully recorded in sculptural form by English effigy carvers. Join Toby as he discusses his investigation, spanning nearly three decades, of effigies and armour in England, telling something of the story behind his award-winning Armour of the English Knight series of books.

You can get the lecture here.

Mars and the Muses: the Renaissance Art of Armour

Armour was a fundamental Renaissance art-form. By the sixteenth century, most of the richest noblemen in Europe were dedicated patrons of the armourer’s art. Armour represented a complex visual language, developed to project aristocratic identity, prestige and power. The armour-making process demanded both fantastic skill in the sculpting of iron and steel, and mastery of decorative techniques such as acid-etching and mercury-gilding. This talk provides an introduction to the concept of armour as art, exploring how protective equipment for fighting became an expressive art-form. Here the achievements of virtuoso armourer-artists embodied magnificence, radiating detailed and subtle messages about status, affinity, social order and divine power.

You can get the lecture here.

Emilia Skirmuntt on Diversity:

My friend (and podcast guest) Emilia Skirmuntt has given a lecture on diversity in HMA. Why it’s important and how to promote it. Worth a listen if you want to know how to help your club attract and keep a more diverse student base. Check it out here!

Chris Schweizer swag

My friend (and podcast guest) Chris Schweizer has massively over-delivered on his Kickstarter campaign. I mean seriously:

The picture of the cinquedea is the original watercolour reproduced in the book. The rest of the standalone pics are high-quality prints. And the book is bloody gorgeous, inside and out. Colour me one happy backer :)

I very much hope the book will be published outside of the kickstarter. When it is I’ll let you know!

What I’m Reading

I’ve been busy the last couple of weeks, and rather low on spoons, so have been mostly chilling out with Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan Saga, all of which I’ve re-read multiple times. So no point updating you much here. I have just started Abraham Verghese’s The Covenant of Water, good so far…

cheers,

Guy